HKB
stripes and beheaded. All these enactments, though against the feelings of the patricians, passed off without opposition from them, because as yet no severity was aimed at any particular individual.
Then, both the tribunician power and the liberty of the commons having been firmly established, the tribunes, now deeming it both safe and seasonable to attack individuals, singled out Verginius as the first prosecutor and Appius as defendant. When Verginius had appointed a day for Appius to take his trial, and Appius had come down to the forum, accompanied by a band of young patricians, the recollection of his most profligate exercise of power was instantly revived in the minds of all, as soon as they beheld the man himself and his satellites. Then said Verginius: "Long speeches are only meant for matters of a doubtful nature. Accordingly, I shall neither waste time in dwelling on the guilt of this man before you, from whose cruelty you have rescued yourselves by force of arms, nor will I suffer him to add impudence to his other crimes in defending himself. Wherefore, Appius Claudius, I pardon you for all the impious and nefarious deeds you have had the effrontery to commit one after another for the last two years; with respect to one charge only, unless you shall choose a judge who shall acquit you that you have not sentenced a free person to slavery, contrary to the laws, I shall order that you be taken into custody." Neither in the aid of the tribunes, nor in the judgment of the people, could Appius place any hope: still he both appealed to the tribunes, and, when no one heeded him, being seized by the officer, he exclaimed, "I appeal." The hearing of this one word that safeguard of liberty, and the fact that it was uttered from that mouth, by which a free citizen was so recently consigned to slavery, caused silence. And, while they loudly declared, each on his own behalf, that at length the existence of the gods was proved, and that they did not disregard human affairs; and that punishments awaited tyranny and cruelty, which punishments, though late, were, however, by no means light; that that man now appealed, who had abolished all right of appeal; and that he implored the protection of the people, who had trampled under foot all the rights of the people: and that he was being dragged off to prison, destitute of the rights of liberty, who had doomed a free person to slavery, the voice of Appius himself was heard, amid the murmurs of the assembly, imploring the protection of the Roman people. He enumerated the services of his ancestors to the state, at home and abroad: his own unfortunate anxiety for the interests of the Roman commons, owing to which he had resigned the consulship, to the very great displeasure of the patricians, for the purpose of equalizing the laws; he then went on to mention those laws of his, the framer of which was dragged off to prison, though the laws still remained in force. However, in regard to what bore especially on his own case, his personal merits and demerits, he would make trial of them, when an opportunity should be afforded him of stating his defence; at present, he, a Roman citizen, demanded, by the common right of citizenship, that he be allowed to speak on the day appointed, and to appeal to the judgment of the Roman people: he did not dread popular odium so much as not to place any hope in the fairness and compassion of his fellow-citizens. But if he were led to prison without being heard, that he once more appealed to the tribunes of the people, and warned them not to imitate those whom they hated. But if the tribunes acknowledged themselves bound by the same agreement for abolishing the right of appeal, which they charged the decemvirs with having conspired to form, then he appealed to the people, he implored the aid of the laws passed that very year, both by the consuls and tribunes, regarding the right of appeal. For who would there be to appeal, if this were not allowed a person as yet uncondemned, whose case had not been heard? What plebeian or humble individual would find protection in the laws, if Appius Claudius could not? That he would be a proof whether tyranny or liberty was established by the new laws, and whether the right of appeal and of challenge against the injustice of magistrates was only held out in idle words, or really granted.